Introduction: It has been shown that three new synthetic coumarins-3-carboxamides including 3-fluorobenzilchloride, 4-fluorobenzilchloride and 2-hidroxy-3 metoxybenzaldehyde, have acetylcholinesterase inhibitory activity. This study was performed to estimate ameliorating effect of these new coumarin-3-carboxamides on memory impairments induced by scopolamine (1 mg/kg, induced prolongation) in mice.

Methods: 30 male mice were divided into five groups, 6 mice in each group. Three experiment groups received coumarins-3- carboxamides (10 mg/kg body weight) 30 min before scopalamin injection and two other groups considered as normal (saline-treated) groups and finally one negative control (scopalamin only) group. The experiment groups were treated with coumarins of 3-fluorobenzilchloride, 4-fluorobenzilchloride and 2-hidroxy-3 metoxybenzaldehyde. The passive avoidance test was performed in an automatic conventional shuttle box set-up. The stepped down latency and number of errors was recorded.

Results: With reference to saline-treated group, scopolamine-treated mice demonstrated impairment of learning and memory as a reduction of latency and an increased numbers of errors in step-down test)p < 0.01). Treated mice receiving these coumarins at the dose of 10 mg/kg showed an increase in the number of avoidances on the memory tests compared to the scopolamine group (p < 0.01).

Conclusion: The study has demonstrated some therapeutic effects of coumarin-3-carboxamides on learning and memory deficit induced by scopolamine. Further investigation is needed to explore whether coumarin-3-carboxamides could be beneficial for memory impairment in Alzheimer’s disease in which cholinergic deficit is one of the hallmarks.